


The Real Test

by TerraCottaNightmare



Series: Like No One Ever Was [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Begone plot, Everyone Loves Stiles Stilinski, F/M, Fluff, For one half-sentence, Gen, I Tried, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I'm not sorry, Like one argument, SUPER vague allusion to canonical child abuse, Scott McCall (Teen Wolf) is a Failwolf, Scott is a Bad Friend, This probably sucks, This was written around a single sentence, guess which one, stiles is pack mom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-06-27 14:46:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15687540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TerraCottaNightmare/pseuds/TerraCottaNightmare
Summary: Stiles becomes a part of the pack, and has an argument with Scott.





	The Real Test

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, I'm naming these in accordance with the Pokemon theme song. No, this series has nothing to do with Pokemon, but the plot does have something to do with each lyric I used. I'm not sorry.  
> There shouldn't be any warnings for this one. It's from Isaac's POV, and at one point he mentions the freezer thing from canon, for like half a sentence and really really vaguely, but that's all.

Staying with the Stilinski’s is not the worst thing Isaac has ever done, by any stretch of the imagination. That it ends up not classifying as bad, or even just okay, is the surprising part.  
Obviously it beats out living with his father and the train station by an enormous margin. Stiles’ place has no freezers in the basement full of dried blood and long echoing screams. It also, as promised, has no permeating stench of death, unless one’s definition of ‘death’ is vaguely musty and floral.  
All in all, the basement is pretty sweet. There are a few couches and an old mattress, which Erica claimed for her and Boyd almost immediately. He suspected that the only reason Derek didn’t take it on principle was because Stiles had threatened to withhold bacon rights from the first “puppy” to start something. He’d learned just how serious he was when, at his snarled insistence at not being a puppy, he was denied meat of any kind for two whole days.  
The first thing that had happened upon their arrival at Stiles’ place, after he’d awkwardly situated them in his living room, was Stiles cooking a feast the likes of which Isaac had only seen on TV, for big holidays or the like. It wasn’t even that fancy-- just spaghetti with meat sauce, cheesy garlic bread, and chocolate chip cookies for dessert-- but the sheer amount of it was staggering for such a short amount of time to prepare. Stiles flushes as they shift to face him, faces ranging from stunned awe to slightly less stoic than normal.  
“I wasn’t lying about the baking montages.”  
He hadn’t been. If not for the accelerated metabolism, they’d have probably gained thirty pounds in the first couple weeks.  
Slowly, incrementally, they had relaxed from hiding out in the basement for all except meals to staying to help with dishes or clean counters, and from there daring to linger in the living room for a movie or a round of Mario Kart. Derek was amazingly, hilariously bad at Mario Kart, but his “shut-the-fuck-up-I’ll-end-you” growls had gotten less serious and more joking as the days went on.  
While technically, Erica and Boyd do actually have homes and families to return to, they spend less and less time there, going from obligatory pack nights once a week to obligatory family nights once a week. Isaac can sense the difference in his chest, barely-there pack bonds growing in strength and cementing themselves in place.  
He’d eaten himself into a comfortable food coma, spayed out over a well worn couch and watching Erica and Stiles debate the quality of Suicide Squad. If he were a werecat, he’d probably be purring.  
Almost simultaneously, all three of them snapped their heads towards the door. Moments later it opened, and Stiles tensed.  
“Stiles, my mom says I need to grab that casserole dish she leant you, where do you--?”  
Scott rounded the corner and froze, eyes flashing briefly yellow and a surprised growl rising in his chest. Isaac felt his wolf respond instinctively in kind, rolling off the couch to stand shoulder to shoulder with a snarling Erica.  
“Scotty-boy, great to see you, how about I give you that dish and we go talk on the porch real quick?”  
Stiles had practically dived in front of them, back to them as he addressed his friend. He nodded reassuringly to them as he steered Scott out the door, looking like he wanted to protest. There were some clanking sounds from the kitchen, the front door opened and closed, and Scott immediately started questioning Stiles.  
“What on earth are they doing here?!”  
All three betas had their heads cocked, listening in unapologetically.  
“They live here for now.”  
“WHAT?!”  
Isaac could practically hear Stiles flinching at the sudden volume, and realized that he’d been growling.  
“They were staying in an old broken down building, Scott, I couldn’t just let them stay there when I had the space--”  
“What the hell, Stiles? What, they looked really sad so you just-- invite them to live with you? Believe it or not, stiles, being werewolves doesn’t actually make them puppies! Has it occured to you that they’re most likely just using you?”  
Erica whimpered.  
“They are not.”  
Stiles’ voice had gone very, dangerously low, in a way none of them had ever heard before.  
“Stiles--”  
“NO, Scott. They are not using me.”  
“They’re what, shacking up in your house free of charge? I know how much werewolves eat, Stiles, how can you even affo--”  
The betas had relaxed as their Alpha finally, finally returned from grocery shopping, his car pulling onto the street.  
“Derek Hale is staying with you too? What the fuck, Stiles!”  
“Yes Scott, he is.”  
“Why?”  
“Because I didn’t want them to have to stay in a place that no sane person had entered since, like, the sixties.”  
“It’s not your job to take care of them, Stiles! I’m pretty sure it’s his, actually. If he can’t take care of his own betas--”  
Isaac had shot forward, ready to rip Scott’s throat out. Boyd had caught his arm and gestured for him to listen.  
“Derek isn’t a perfect Alpha, alright? He’s like someone playing the Sims for the first time, and he made one adult and three toddlers and now he has to keep them happy and healthy and keep them from getting taken away by CPS. But he’s trying, and he’s doing better. Just because you didn’t get a choice in being bitten doesn’t mean that no one else should be, if they make that choice for themselves, and just because you don’t want to join Derek’s pack doesn’t mean that I can’t help out people who obviously need it.”  
The new pack bond nearly knocks him off of his feet as it slots into place, wispy and immaterial but just as bright and, for lack of a better word, extra as Stiles is. Beside him, Erica sits down very fast on the couch, eyes full of confusion and wonder. Boyd joins her, impassive as always, but the ghost of a smile plays around the edge of his mouth.  
Derek’s car had parked, Stiles had sent Scott off with the dish and a proverbial pat on the head and then called for “all the little eavesdropping puppies” to come help with groceries so that he could start dinner.  
If all of them, even Derek, happen to touch him in a way that looks like scenting while they do it, well, none of them feel the need to say anything.

**Author's Note:**

> I actually made an outline for this series, shocker, so it will actually feature some plot soon... If I actually make myself work on it.


End file.
